


Dark Sister

by rowenablade



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: 1 part fluff to like 10 parts angst, Arya has issues, BAMF Podrick, But some fluff manages to get through the cracks, F/M, Feel free to substitute your own headcanons where applicable, More plot than originally intended, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Pining, Podrick is sweet, Politics at this stage are super complicated and I am basically tackling things as they come up, Set during season 8, So everyone wears black and speaks very carefully, That's the best I can do apparently, Unrequited Love, War, White Walkers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-25
Updated: 2019-03-29
Packaged: 2019-08-29 02:18:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 16,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16735158
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rowenablade/pseuds/rowenablade
Summary: The War for the Dawn is underway, and those who chose to stay at Winterfell are trapped by the snows and the approaching army of the dead.Some people handle the stress better than others.  Arya Stark tries to keep her sanity, while Podrick Payne tries to make the best of things.





	1. Chapter 1

Winterfell was the coldest, wettest, greyest place Podrick Payne had ever been. He woke up cold and went to sleep cold, frost in his hair, his toes and fingertips numb. No matter how high he built the fire in his room he could never seem to stay warm.

Now that the King in the North had joined forces with the Dragon Queen, the castle was overrun with soldiers and camp followers from every corner of the world. Every time Podrick left his room some fresh chaos would be waiting for him. Dothraki, wildlings, Unsullied, soldiers from the North, sellswords from the South, not to mention all the houses of Westeros, some of whom had until a few months before been at war with each other. They had all united to fight the dead, and the creatures who led them, but none of them made easy bedfellows. As the Lady of Winterfell’s chief enforcer, Lady Brienne spent a great deal of her time breaking up brawls and disciplining misbehavior. It turned out Dothraki screamers and foot soldiers from Bear Island alike were not pleased to be chastened by a woman. Few dared to challenge her, and those that did quickly found themselves sporting new bruises and reduced to half-rations for a week. Most of them stuck with verbal abuse, much of which ended up directed at Pod. He’d been told once before that everyone wanted to hit a squire. They might not dare to hit him, but they were happy to call him a toadying little shit in a variety of languages. Podrick suspected at this point that he knew more curse words than the saltiest of pirates.

The only time the host truly united was when the dead turned up. They would arrive in squadrons, sometimes only a handful, sometimes a couple hundred. Their Majesties were working hard up at the ruins of the Wall to keep the White Walkers away from Winterfell, but still the dead managed to pass their ranks, growing in numbers every time they came across a village. When they approached the castle, the horns would blow and soldiers of every stripe would race to be the first to meet them on the field. Everyone took equal joy in killing the dead.

It was a hard life, and it was going to get harder. Food supplies were already starting to run low, and Lady Stark had reduced rations twice and ordered floggings for those caught stealing or hoarding. Game grew scarce, so there was no more hunting. The cellars ran low, and soon there would be no more drinking. Soldiers started to get bored, and more violent, which meant more punishment and resentment. The center could not hold forever.

Podrick saw all this, and worried. But he could not be unhappy. He was in love.

Mad, they called her. The Black Wolf, Arya Ice-Heart, the Dark Sister. They said she could change her face at will, that she had been trained in the art of murder and black magic far away in Braavos. They said she kept a necklace of ears taken from those she’d killed. Some whispered that she was the chosen consort of a demon whom she summoned in the dead of night in the crypts below. Some said she _was_ a demon, wearing Arya Stark’s face and form, and was waiting for the snows to trap them in so she could feast on their hearts and eyes at her pleasure.

People loved to talk.

Podrick saw the good in her, the same as he had seen in Brienne and Tyrion. He understood the way a warrior woman had to present herself to be taken seriously. He understood how fear could be a useful tool for someone small. So he felt no fear around Arya, and when he caught people speaking ill of her, he would stand up tall and remind them, “You are speaking of Lady Arya Stark, sister to the King and heiress to Winterfell. You will show her respect.”

Sometimes they laughed at him, and sometimes they called him mad, too. He didn’t mind. Even just the chance to say her name was sweet. He said it to himself, sometimes, when he was alone. _Arya_. 

They rarely spoke to one another, although sometimes they trained together. Months of being thumped senseless by Brienne had erased all hesitation about swinging his practice sword at a woman, and he could tell Arya appreciated this. When she bested him, or on the rare occasions he bested her, she’d give him the gift of her smile, brilliant as a bolt of sunshine through the clouds. One of her smiles could make Pod’s joy last for days.

When not training or in seclusion with her sister, Arya rode beyond the castle walls. Hunting, she said at first. Then, when she had not brought back any game in weeks because there was nothing left to hunt, she said she was simply riding to clear her head. No one believed her, and many, including her sister, were concerned for her safety, but no one dared to stop her. It was one of the unspoken rules of Winterfell; the Stark women could go where they pleased. Sansa could be trusted to be sensible about such things, but Arya was another matter. She began to stay out longer and longer, until Brienne’s brow was permanently creased with worry.

Everyone in the castle would hold their breath until she returned, sometimes with a brace of squirrels or a skinny rabbit slung across her saddle, more often empty-handed and dirty. Sometimes she would have scrapes or bruises. Sometimes her breeches would be stained with blood, black and brackish fluid that did not look human. She’d sleep for a long time after these excursions, or seclude herself in the crypts or the godswood. 

Daylight grew scarce. The sun only rose for a few hours at a time, and it became harder and harder to tell one day from another. One morning Arya left the castle at first light, and it had been dark for many hours before the watchman called out that she was returning.

Lady Sansa had immediately come out to meet Arya, as furious as Pod had ever seen her. She shouted at her sister out there in the courtyard in front of everyone, asking her how she could be so irresponsible, did she not know that everyone had been sick with worry for her? Under other circumstance it might have been comic, the normally austere Lady of Winterfell scolding her dangerous little sister as if she were a child who had dawdled too long with a friend. Then Arya rode into the light from the torches, and Pod saw the gash on her leg.

He sprinted forward without thinking, ignoring the shocked looks from Sansa and the others. He only had eyes for Arya, saw that she was pale and slumped in her saddle but her eyes as sharp as ever. She still gripped the pommel of her sword with one bloody hand. When Pod ran up to her she looked right through him for a second, as if trying to remember who he was.

“Lady Arya, you’re hurt,” he said, trying to make his voice gentle. “Let me help you down.”

Arya nodded and used Pod’s shoulder to steady herself as she dismounted her horse. As she did Pod got a better look at the cut on her leg. It ran from knee to mid-thigh, and looked deep. She’d packed it with snow at some point, and the skin was raw and red in some places, worryingly white in others.

“You need to see Maester Wolkan, my lady. Right away.”

“S’fine,” she muttered, and let go of his shoulder, putting her full weight on both legs. She maintained posture for a moment, then her injured leg buckled and spilled her against his chest. Sansa and Brienne both ran up to them as Pod struggled to maintain propriety as well as keep her from falling. He ended up with an arm about her waist, her arm around his shoulders. They swayed there like two friends stumbling home from a tavern, looking up at the worried faces surrounding them.

“Arya, Pod is going to take you to see the maester,” Sansa said, forcing composure back into her voice. 

“I’m fine,” Arya insisted, more clearly this time. “It’s just a stupid cut.”

“You want to lose that leg?” This from Brienne, who had quickly learned that standing on ceremony with Arya got one nowhere. “If it’s fine then it won’t take long for Maester Wolkan to look at it.” She met Arya’s eyes, and Pod saw that flicker of understanding between the two of them that had been present since the day they’d met on their way to the Vale. Arya nodded and let Pod slowly lead her away.

As they left, Pod heard Sansa whispering to Brienne. “Find the master-at-arms and meet me in my chambers. I need to speak with you both.” A pause, then, “Don’t tell him about this.”

Arya laughed softly, and Pod saw sweat beading on her pale face. He shifted to take more of her weight and began to walk faster.

——

Maester Wolkan had assumed his position at Winterfell under the Boltons. He had seen a goodly amount of horrible things and remained a kind man, but he was an old-fashioned sort and clearly had no idea what to make of the younger Lady Stark. He forced a brittle smile when he opened his door to Pod and Arya, a smile that quickly fell when he saw her wounded leg and unhealthy pallor.

“Lady Arya’s been injured,” Pod explained. At the same time Arya growled, ”My sodding leg’s on fire.”

Wolkan flinched, and Pod ducked his head apologetically. “Please, maester. Lady Sansa’s worried.”

The maester nodded silently and ushered them through the door and into the small antechamber that he reserved for more delicate work. The room smelled of dried herbs and soap, and as Pod breathed it in he felt calmer. Arya would be alright. She was surrounded by those who loved her.

Maester Wolkan shut the door as Pod helped Arya up onto the long table that dominated the room. He gripped her shoulders to help her stay upright, and she twisted to look at him.

“I can sit up,” she said, not unkindly. “I rode all the way back here.”

“Apologies, my lady,” Pod replied. Then, hesitantly, “You gave us all quite a scare.”

Arya grimaced and turned to the Maester. “Brienne says I could lose this leg.”

“Try to relax, my lady,” Wolkan replied. He produced a small blade and began to cut away the fabric of Arya’s breeches to get a better look at the cut. Pod stood by, wondering if he should leave. He was about to move for the door when Wolkan said, “Pod, would you fill a basin from that pitcher there? And bring me the willowbark. The blue jar.”

Pod obliged, and Maester Wolkan cleaned the wound, sneaking worried glances at Arya’s face. “How did you get cut like this, my lady? Did you suffer a fall?”

Arya snorted. “I suffered a dead man’s sword in my leg. Can you fix me or not?”

Arya’s steely gaze met Wolkan’s bewildered one. Pod saw concern and disapproval flicker across the old man’s face, and interrupted before words could be put to these expressions.

“The dead often carry rusted weapons. That means greater chance for the wound to rot, yes?”

Wolkan twitched in surprise. “Yes,” he said, hesitantly, then repeating it with more firmness. “Yes. I’ll need to treat the wound with boiling wine, my lady. And you’ll be needing stitches.”

Satisfied that the Maester was going to keep his opinions of her behavior to himself, Arya relaxed a bit and nodded. “Do what you have to do then.”

“Pod, if you look in the left-most cupboard there, I should have some milk of the poppy left.”

Pod moved to get it, but Arya was already shaking her head. “Don’t waste it on me. I don’t need it, and we’re almost out. Save it for the dying.”

“Lady Arya, everything in this castle belongs to the Starks. If you want something for the pain-“

“I don’t need it,” Arya repeated. 

“It’s going to be quite painful, m’lady.”

“Give me some of that.” Arya pointed at the wineskin that Wolkan was now holding, pouring its contents into a tiny cauldron above the fire. He frowned and handed it over, and Arya took a long pull. She coughed at the roughness of the product, then took another swig and handed it back to him.

The maester gave a resigned shrug and resumed pouring. “Pod, I’ll need you to stay and help me hold her leg steady. Unless you’d rather I call for a female assistant, m’lady?”

Arya snorted again, and Pod felt a small smile tug at the corners of his mouth. He busied himself washing his hands and rolling up his sleeves so no one else would see it.

When Wolkan was ready, he nodded at Pod, who put one hand just below Arya’s knee, the other on her upper thigh. Wolkan dipped a ladle into the boiling wine, and began to pour it in thin streams over the cut.

Arya hissed through her teeth and her leg jerked once beneath Pod’s grip, but otherwise she didn’t move. Pod stared at her profile in the firelight, at her delicate chin and her proud high forehead. He always noticed how beautiful she was in the oddest moments; when she knocked him to the ground, or when she was angry, or when bad news from the Wall arrived. He noticed it now, and he felt a sudden urge to kiss her cheek and tell her how brave she was. Of course she would only laugh at him. She didn’t need him to tell her she was brave, and she certainly wouldn’t welcome a kiss. 

Still, it was nice to think about.

Then Wolkan began the stitching, heating a needle and threading fine catgut twine through the edges of Arya’s wound. When the hot needle pierced her skin Arya’s leg spasmed, and Pod was forced to lean more of his weight on it to keep it steady. 

The maester worked in silence, wholly absorbed by the task. Arya’s leg trembled under Pod’s grip, and then he felt her fingers grip his shoulder.

He looked into her eyes and offered what he hoped was a reassuring smile. Arya laughed softly and rolled her eyes, but she kept her hand on Pod’s shoulder, squeezing occasionally when the needle made another plunge.

“Now, Lady Arya,” Wolkan began as he tidied up. “I must recommend you don’t ride anymore, or leave the castle walls without an escort. Our enemies are exceptionally dangerous, and if you-“

“Are you saying you won’t fix me again?”

Arya’s tone was icy, but Pod could swear he heard the voice of a little girl beneath it, tired of being scolded for coming home dirty.

“Of course not,” Maester Wolkan answered. “I’m sworn to serve your family, my lady. I am only suggesting you apply yourself to more…practical activities.”

Arya responded with a bitter laugh that turned into a cough. “Help me up, Pod.” She reached out and found Pod’s shoulder, leaning her weight on him as she heaved herself off the table. “Let’s not waste any more of Maester Wolkan’s precious time.”

Pod smiled a faint apology at the old man as he swung his door shut.

“Stupid old git,” Arya muttered. “Bowed and scraped for Ramsay Bolton, then turns around and tries to tell me what to do.”

She began to slowly make her way down the hall toward her chamber and Pod followed cautiously, not wanting to cause offense by offering to help her walk but also not wanting to let her make her way alone.

They’d gotten about twenty paces before Arya swore and turned to face him. “Help me to my room, would you Pod? It’s just so fucking sore.”

Pod felt his heart swell and all but leaped toward her, offering his arm. She took it. “If you tell Brienne about this I’ll beat you black and blue. You know that, right?”

“Naturally, my lady,” Pod responded. ‘If you’re in a condition to do any such thing after your sister is through with you.”

Arya scowled. “She acts just like Mother now. Just you watch, tomorrow morning she’ll make me promise her I’ll never ride out alone again.”

“Why do you ride out alone?” Pod was not certain anyone had asked Arya this. Perhaps no one expected an honest answer, but Arya had never lied to him. “What are you doing out there?”

Arya’s eyes seemed to fix on a point far away.

“Chasing cats,” she said sadly. Then she was silent the rest of the way to her room.


	2. Chapter 2

Sansa was waiting for them when they got to Arya’s room. The dark circles under her eyes were the only visible sign of her recent distress; the Lady of Winterfell refused to appear as anything less than immaculate outside the privacy of her chambers. She was standing outside the door to Arya’s room, tall and stern, and Pod felt his grip around the younger Stark’s waist tighten protectively.

“Are you here to lock me up?” Arya asked without preamble. Her voice was as flat as if she were inquiring about tomorrow’s supper, but Pod noticed the tension between the two women all the same.

“No.” Sansa’s voice was quiet and dangerously soft, and had Pod not been holding Arya up he would have taken his leave of them then. Instead he stood there awkwardly while Arya braced herself against his shoulder and tested her weight on her injured leg.

“Which one of them talked you out of it, then? Brienne or the Hound?”

Sansa narrowed her eyes the same way Pod remembered Cersei Lannister doing when she perceived an insult. He suspected Sansa was unaware of the resemblance, hoped she would never find out.

“Arya.” Sansa stepped toward them, leaning forward to put her hands on her sister’s shoulders and look her straight in the eye. “No Stark will ever be a prisoner in Winterfell again. I don’t need anyone to remind me of that. Do you understand?”

“Yes.” Arya met her sister’s gaze levelly, her eyes as black and sharp as dragonglass.

“I’m asking you as your sister to never do something like this again,” Sansa continued. “I won’t force you, and I won’t command it, but Arya-“ her voice broke. “The lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Remember?”

Arya’s expression softened, and she let go of Pod to lean her weight more fully against her sister. “I remember,” she whispered, letting the taller woman pull her close.

“The pack can’t lose you. I can’t-“

“It’s alright.” Arya wrapped her arms around her sister and Pod looked away, wanting to let the Starks have their moment in private but too well bred to walk away without being dismissed. “I’ll stay here. I'll have an easier time finding sparring partners with a crippled leg, won't I, Pod?”

“Quite possibly, my lady,” Pod stammered, and the girls both laughed. Sansa composed herself and turned to him. 

“Thank you for your help tonight, Pod. You may leave us.”

Pod nodded and took his leave of them. He decided to see if anyone was awake in the dining hall; despite the lateness of the hour he was far from sleepy.

——

Arya proved true to her word, although by the third day many were probably wishing that she hadn’t. The girl was in a black mood, and she took it out on those closest to her. She was sullen and taciturn with Sansa, she argued with Brienne, and she took to insulting the Hound so mercilessly that he’d eventually hurled a pewter mug at her that caught her square on the forehead. Arya told Sansa and Maester Wolkan that the resulting bruise was from falling down while attempting to favor her injured leg, and took to avoiding common spaces.

She started spending more and more time with Bran.

The mysterious youth who called himself the Three-Eyed Raven, and who long ago had been Brandon Stark, stayed in a modest but well-appointed room on the first floor of the castle. Sometimes one of his sisters wheeled his chair to the godswood, and servants would lift him in and out of bed at regular intervals, but these things were done out of habit, not at the young man’s request. He hadn’t spoken more than ten words at a time in over a month. He took food when it was pressed upon him and occasionally turned to look at people when they spoke to him, but otherwise he was more like a living, breathing doll than a boy.

The change in him had happened suddenly, and both of the Stark sisters blamed themselves.

Pod had been there when it happened, polishing Lady Brienne’s armor in the corner of the Great Hall while the Starks discussed the war. It had been weeks since any news from the ruins of the Wall had arrived. The last raven to arrive from Queen Danaerys stated that she and King Jon had held Castle Black against the latest onslaught from the dead, but the Wall had taken significant damage and the Night King’s forces were pouring through. Their infantry was doing all they could to stem the tide of living corpses, but they would have to retreat soon and Winterfell should brace for an attack.

But no great attack had come, and no word from their Majesties either. The only dead that showed up were in the small clusters that they had grown accustomed to. They were easily dispatched, but the whole castle seemed to tremble with anticipation, and when the horns blew announcing new approaching enemies the very air seemed to vibrate.

Sansa and Arya had asked their brother to use his gift to see what was happening at Castle Black. Bran had obliged willingly enough, his eyes rolling back to whites and his body going limp. When he went into these trances he was usually perfectly still for a time, minutes or maybe hours, and when he awakened he could tell them what he’d seen calmly and dispassionately. It was frightening, both the trances and the way Bran reacted to them, as if he were describing the events that happened in a dull, dusty book, but none could deny they were useful.

This time, though, Bran’s trance only lasted a few seconds before he began to spasm in his chair. His limbs jerked about bonelessly and his head lolled on his neck. The girls looked on with concern, then alarm, then panic as his spasming became more frantic and blood started to run from his nose and ears.

Sansa had gripped his shoulders and tried to keep the fear from her voice as she spoke to him. “Bran, come back, it’s all right. We don’t need you to see for us, just come back, please, come back.” She’d trailed off as Bran seemed to still momentarily, then his whole body thrashed with such force that his chair all but leaped off the ground.

The boy threw his head back, his mouth open, and Pod could hear a strangled scream trying to escape his throat. He’d looked straight at his sisters, and then said, coldly, “The things I do for love.”

Then a great gout of blood had poured from his mouth, soaking his doublet. Sansa had screamed for help and Arya had taken off running for the maester.

Bran was unresponsive for hours, during which his sisters and Samwell Tarly had not left his side. Eventually Bran had opened his eyes and could be lifted to his chair, but he answered no questions and could keep down only water.

His condition had improved, and he seemed to be growing stronger, but no one dared ask him to use his Sight again. 

Sam, the most learned man at Winterfell, could offer nothing in the way of explanation. Some of the books he’d read had mentioned the Three-Eyed Raven, but none of them gave any detail about how such visions worked. 

As her leg healed Arya spent a great deal of time sitting near him, sometimes holding his hand, sometimes polishing her blades. Pod was worried she was pressing him for another vision, for news of Jon Snow, but his fears were eased after the first time he overheard her talking to her brother.

He was seeking out Arya at her sister’s request, and as he approached he heard her speaking in gentler tones than he imagined she was capable of.

“On Rickon’s third nameday, Father let us both dress up like knights and joust each other on ponies, do you remember? Mother was worried we’d get hurt, so she dressed the both of us in so much padding that we could barely move. We kept missing each other with the padded lances, and eventually you grew so frustrated that you jumped off your pony and tackled me into the mud.”

Pod smiled at the mental image and Arya noticed he was there. She smiled back, sadly.

“Doesn’t he remember everything that ever happened?” Pod gazed curiously at Bran, whose eyes were shut. 

“He remembers, but he remembers like…” Arya struggled to find the right words. “Like you remember a story you heard a long time ago. Not like something that actually happened to you.” She reached out and took her brother’s limp hand. “I keep hoping that I can help him remember who he is. My brother. Not the Three-Eyed Raven.” She looked up at Pod, her eyes shining. “He was the closest in age to me, you know. And we loved so many of the same things.” 

Pod felt a lump growing in his throat and squeezed her shoulder. “Lady Sansa asked me to find you.”

Arya nodded and rose from her seat. “Would you stay with him until I get back, Pod? I don’t like leaving him alone.”

Pod bowed his head in agreement, although the idea of sitting with the silent Stark boy unnerved him. Still, he took the chair that Arya offered and watched her walk away.


	3. Chapter 3

“Now, the trick to keeping all your fingers is not to slow down. You slow down, see, and you lose the rhythm of it. That’s when you make mistakes.”

Bronn leaned forward, causing the flaxen-haired woman in his lap to giggle and spill a bit of her drink, and sank a knife, straight down, into the wooden table. The young recruit across the table grinned and reached for the hilt.

“The trick to keeping all your fingers is not to play this game in the first place,” Pod interjected.

Bronn glared. “Keep out of it, Pod, I’ve got a day’s rations riding on this.” He did something that made the girl on his knee jump, then smirked. “And maybe something sweet besides.”

Pod rolled his eyes and turned his attention back to his tankard. He supposed he had not been giving the combined forces at Winterfell enough credit when he assumed that there would be no more drinking after the cellars ran dry. It turned out that wherever you found men, you found ways to get drunk. The substance they were currently punishing was made from fermented mare’s milk and tasted like it had been sicked up once already. The method came courtesy of the Dothraki and the result certainly had the intended effect, but Pod missed good brown ale with every swig of vile stuff.

The promise of drink and warmth had been enough to lure a handful of Winter’s Town whores to the small gathering of soldiers in the castle barracks. One of them sat near Pod now, and blushed a little when he accidentally made eye contact with her over the rim of his cup. She’d been near him most of the night, offering demure comments and light touches on his arm or hand whenever she could. Her name was Maery, and she had soft black hair and freckles and a turned-up nose. She was very pretty, and Pod did not mind her sitting next to him, but it was obvious from her touches that she had other expectations. It caused a sour feeling in his stomach to think of it. Had it been summer, she might have been a flower-seller or a shepherdess, walking in sunlight, sleeping in freshly-plowed fields under benevolent stars.

It was winter now. There were no more flowers, no more sheep, and this girl was willing to sell her body for a warm bed to sleep in and enough drink to ease her dreams.

It saddened him. He smiled when she smiled and refilled the cup in front of her without being asked, but he did not return her touches and tried to avoid her hungry eyes.

He was thinking of heading off to bed when a woman’s raised voice brought the other conversations to a halt.

“Here, sweetling, shouldn’t you be in bed?”

Bronn’s girl- Pod thought her name was Delia- was the one who had shouted. She was reaching a beckoning hand out to a small figure lurking in the doorway.

Arya stepped into the torchlight, looking very small in her loose black shirt and breeches. A low murmur traveled through those gathered as she was recognized.

“I’m not tired.” Her voice was clipped, guarded; it gave away nothing besides the words it formed.

Delia hesitated, and Bronn cut in.

“No surprise, really. Who’s to say when bedtime is when the day’s only a few hours long?” He waved an expansive arm, taking in the now-silent party. “We’ve drink, if your ladyship is thirsty.”

Arya crept forward. Her leg was all but healed, and her measured steps made no sound at all as she crossed over to the table.

Bronn nudged the woman off his lap and stood to pour a fresh tankard. He held it out to Arya, who took a cautious sip and then made a face.

“Tastes like piss, doesn’t it?” Bronn remarked.

“Wouldn’t know,” Arya answered, taking another, longer draught. “Never drank piss before.”

One of the women let out a sharp laugh, too loud in the subdued room, and the rest of those gathered shifted uncomfortably.

Maery inched closer to Pod, eyes wide and frightened, and gave a whimper of fear when the movement caused Arya to look in their direction. Arya looked from her to Pod and then smirked.

“You know he’s just a squire,” she said to Maery, and then drained the rest of the tankard.

“Oh, our Pod doesn’t need fancy titles to impress the ladies,” Bronn cackled. “Didn’t he ever tell you about his magic-“

“What’s that for?” Arya interrupted, to Pod’s considerable relief. She was indicating the knife, still stuck point-down in the table.

“Just a game I picked up in Braavos.” Pod watched Bronn’s right hand slide across the table, closer to the knife. Putting it in easy reach. “I could show you the rules, but I think you’re a bit young to play.”

There was a flurry of motion. Pod saw Arya’s hand dart out, saw Bronn snatch the knife off the table, and then something happened that was too quick for him to track. When the movement stopped Arya was standing chest to chest with the weathered sellsword. He held the knife against her stomach, while she held her ornate dagger to his throat. Pod hadn’t even seen where she’d been keeping it.

“I learned some games in Braavos too,” Arya said softly. 

For a moment the two killers stood, breathing each other’s air. Pod felt his ears grow hot and his teeth clench. Something about the look that passed between them, a sort of mutual understanding, made him want to throw Bronn to the ground and throttle him. It baffled him; Bronn was a friend, perhaps his oldest friend if Pod thought about it. But just seeing Bronn stand that close to Arya, look so deeply into her eyes, filled his gut with poison.

At last Bronn withdrew his knife and slowly raised his hands. 

“No offense meant, little lady-“

“Then don’t call me that.”

“No offense meant, _Lady Stark_. Forgive a man for being a bit curious, the rumors about you being so grand and all. Half the people in this room thought you’d come to eat our hearts and drink our blood.”

“Did you?” Far from offended, Arya’s voice was amused.

“I believe in what I see, m’lady. I see a skinny girl who’s good with a blade. Nothing more.”

Arya took the knife from Bronn’s throat, to a collective exhalation from the crowd.

“I see an aging cutthroat who’d sell his own mother if the price was right. My sister should have thrown you in a cell along with the Kingslayer.”

“And deprive her soldiers of my company?” Now that Arya had backed away a couple of steps, Bronn was once again grinning easily. “She’s firm, your sister, but she isn’t cruel.”

Arya rolled her eyes and turned toward Pod and Maery. She concealed her knife as she went; by the time she faced them fully Pod could no longer tell where it had come from.

“What about you?” This she said to Maery, who had shrunk behind Pod and was peering at Arya over his shoulder. “You think I’m a monster?”

“No, m’lady!” the girl squeaked. Arya smirked and kept stalking forward, and Maery’s fingers dug into Pod’s upper arm.

“Arya.” Pod tried to meet her gaze, to keep his voice calm and measured, but it was difficult. The threat of violence still circled the room like a bat. “You’re welcome to stay, but there’s no call to be unfriendly.”

“Don’t worry, Pod, I won’t scare away your whore.” She nodded mockingly at Maery, then turned on her heel. She was almost out the door when she called over her shoulder to Bronn, who had been watching the whole exchange with one hand still on his dagger’s hilt.

“Find me in the training yard tomorrow, sellsword. I’d like to see what other games you know.”

Bronn raised his tankard to her as she left, then sidled up to Pod as the room crept back into conversation.

“Mad as a snake, that one,” he muttered.

“Don’t.” Pod looked around for Maery, but she’d drifted over to a knot of soldiers across the room, her face white beneath her freckles. “You shouldn’t have teased her like that.”

“Think she’ll try to kill me tomorrow?” Bronn shrugged. “Wouldn’t be the first girl that tried to kill me. Might be the first to give me a real fight.”

Pod glared, and Bronn clapped him on the shoulder. “Here now, you usually have more of a sense of humor than this. What’s got you so gloomy? That Maery was all over you and you barely spared her a glance. Now her bloody ladyship comes in here spoiling for a fight and you act like it’s your job to protect her honor. You have a mind to become Podrick Payne, Prince of Winterfell or what?”

Pod opened his mouth, found no words, and closed it again.

Bronn goggled at him for a moment, then burst into laughter.

“Seven hells, it’s true. The squire has eyes only for the highborn maid. The highborn maid who’d cut your throat as soon as look at you.”

Pod was silent. He’d never been a good liar, and he didn’t want to lie to his friend. 

“Her sister’s prettier,” Bronn remarked.

Pod shrugged. 

“You want my advice-“

“I really don’t”

“-you make your move sooner rather than later. There’s not a lot of highborn girls going spare these days, and this one won’t stay in Winterfell very long.”

“What makes you say that?” Pod was genuinely curious. Arya was strange, but she was loyal to her family. It seemed inconceivable that she would abandon them.

“I’ve seen a few winters,” Bronn said quietly. “Always a few boys and girls that can’t take it without going mad. The snow, the close quarters- they start drinking too much, starting fights with anyone looks at them sideways. Some turn on their families, some just end up running out into the cold and freeze to death a few miles from their huts. She has that look, your lady love. Like a fox in a trap chewing at its own leg.”

“She’s smarter than that,” Pod muttered, trying to get the horrible image Bronn created out of his mind.

“I hope for our sakes you’re right,” Bronn replied. “Be a shame if their majesties defeat the dead only to come back to a castle full of corpses.”

Pod thought of Arya standing in the training yard, sword in hand, surrounded by the dead forces of Winterfell. He shuddered.

“She’s not like that,” he whispered. But the image wouldn’t leave his mind, despite him having several more drinks before finding his way to bed.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A wild plotline appears!

The horns blew in the morning, and the forces of Winterfell tensed up for another battle. This time, though, the dawn did not bring the dead, but refugees from the south. A dozen bedraggled men, women and children stumbled through the castle gates and were barely given time to shake the snow from their clothes before they were brought before the Lady of Winterfell.

Pod stood at attention at the back of the Great Hall. He was nervous for these people. Under previous circumstances, Bran had accompanied Sansa to receive such guests and surreptitiously use his Sight to sense ill intent from them. Now Bran wasn’t speaking, and Sansa had to fall on more conventional methods to ensure good behavior from the new arrivals. She stood behind the large table, flanked by Brienne on one side and Sandor Clegane on the other. Pod looked around for Arya, but did not see her.

The man who appeared to be the leader of the group, a black-bearded fellow with a woodcutter’s broad shoulders, explained that they were smallfolk from the Riverlands. With the Freys gone, the land had fallen into chaos once more, and Cersei Lannister had sent several raiding parties to strip what little resources were left to be had. Desperate, they had banded together and made North, to seek out the last surviving Tully descendants and beg for amnesty.

He finished speaking, and then all was silent but for the nervous stirring of the new arrivals and a few sniffles from the children. When Sansa began to speak, even those minute sounds faded.

“First, allow me to express my regret for the circumstances that drove you to travel North. The conflict between Cersei Lannister and their Majesties has destroyed the homes of many, and as Wardeness of the North I consider it a personal duty to offer whatever shelter I can to those displaced. You will not be harmed here. You have my oath, on my honor as a Tully and a Stark.”

There were some sighs of relief.

“However, Winterfell is at war, and supplies here are short. Your families will be provided rations in exchange for your contributions to the war effort. To my right is my sworn shield Brienne of Tarth, general of Winterfell’s soldiers in the field.”

There were some murmurs in response to this. Brienne, imposing as always in her armor, only nodded curtly at Sansa’s mention of her name.

“To my left is Sandor Clegane, Winterfell’s master-at-arms and commander of the castle guard.”

At this there was a good deal more noise. Clegane glared expectantly at the the crowd, and finally a young man, holding a shivering little girl of about six, spoke up.

“M’lady, that’s the Hound! Surely you don’t-“

“Sandor Clegane has earned the trust of their Majesties and of House Stark,” Sansa said coolly. “I assure you any doubts you might have of his capability will be put to rest once you begin training.”

A stunned silence followed that, and Sansa continued.

“As I was saying, assistance with the war effort is asked of all who stay here. Any men or women over the age of fourteen will be required to report to Lady Brienne and Master Clegane for your abilities in combat to be evaluated. You will be given appropriate tasks, and in exchange, your elders and children will receive House Stark’s full hospitality and protection.”

Some seemed on the verge of protest, but Sansa spoke over them.

“You will be given two days to make your decision, during which time you’ll be fed and sheltered to the best of Winterfell’s abilities. After that, you may either join us in the fight against the invaders from the North, or make your fortune elsewhere.”

Sansa nodded briefly to her guards and to the newcomers, then swept from the room. Brienne and the Hound stepped into the crowd to discuss arrangements, and Pod finally spotted Arya. She had been standing against the far wall, completely hidden behind Sansa and the two giants flanking her. No one spared her a glance as she slunk away, and Pod wondered why Sansa had not seen fit to mention her.

——

Two nights after the arrival of the Riverlands folk, Pod found himself walking the halls with Lady Sansa. She wanted to discuss morale among the troops, a matter on which she felt his perspective might be valuable. More valuable, perhaps, than Brienne’s or the Hound’s, both of whom thought everyone complained too much.

They were approaching her quarters when a small figure materialized at the end of the hallway. It was the little girl who had arrived from the Riverlands in the arms of her father. She had a mop of curly blond hair and huge grey eyes, and a look of intense concentration on her little face.

Sansa gave a startled _oh_ at the sight of her. Both she and Pod stopped short.

“Are you all right, little one?” she called. 

The girl took a couple of hesitant steps forward. Pod felt a creeping sensation on the back of his neck.

“I’m hungry,” the girl said.

The words were appropriate for a child, but there was something wrong about the look on her face. She seemed intensely nervous, like a much older girl faced with a difficult test.

Sansa’s face softened and she stepped closer to the girl, Pod trailing uneasily behind her.

“Poor thing,” Sansa cooed. “Shall we find your father? Is he in the training yard?”

The girl’s brow furrowed. “I'm hungry,” she repeated. “ _I’m hungry_.” She seemed close to tears.

Sansa reached the girl and stooped to lift her up, and Pod felt gooseflesh creep over his neck and arms.

There was a movement on the wall, a shadow that should not have been there. Pod wouldn’t even have noticed if this strange situation didn’t have his guard up. But the unusual movement caught his eye and he whirled around just in time to see the knife coming toward his face.

He shouted out a warning to Sansa and threw his arms up into the blade’s path. Instead of slashing his face, the knife cut through his sleeves and left a shallow gash across his forearms. Pod caught the attacker’s wrist on its downward arc, dragged him forward, and drove his knee with all his might between the assailant’s legs.

The man doubled over and Pod wrenched the knife from his grip, then shoved him to the ground. There was a brief struggle as the attacker tried to throw Pod off of him, but Pod got the knife jammed under his throat and his weight pressing down onto his belly.

It was the little girl’s father, the young man who had spoken up at Sansa’s introduction. He stared up at Pod with cold hatred.

“My lady,” Pod said, not taking his eyes off the pinned man,”are you all right?”

Sansa stood open-mouthed, holding the little girl in her arms. She took a deep breath and whispered, “Yes.”

Pod risked a glance up at them and felt his blood run cold. The little girl was crying. Not in the red-faced, open-mouthed way he would expect a child to cry in this situation, but silently. Tears rolled from her grey eyes down her cheeks, but her expression was stony, and she made not a sound save for a few hitching breaths. It was horrible.

“You should run for help,” Pod managed. “If he tries to escape I’ll have to kill him, and I think we ought to question him first.”

Sansa clutched the little girl to her chest and ran. The would-be assassin looked up at Pod and grinned.

“Guess you’ll have to kill me then, you fucking traitor,” he growled.

Pod slammed the hilt of the knife against the man’s temple. The body beneath him went limp, but Pod still thumped him again to make sure he wasn’t bluffing.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to everyone who has read and commented so far! I've had this fic kicking around in my head for a looong time, it's good to finally send it out to meet the nice people.
> 
> Warning: some implied child abuse in this chapter. I swear to god I didn't mean for this story to get this plot-y when I first thought of it, but I'm having too much fun writing Arya interacting with different characters to keep things strictly on her and Pod.

The cuts on Pod’s arms were shallow enough not to need stitches. Maester Wolkan treated them with quiet efficiency before examining the young man still sprawled on the floor. Once the maester assured Sansa that there was no reason the man shouldn’t wake from his head injury, the killer was taken to a cell. Maester Wolkan stayed to watch over him with a promise that he would alert Sansa the moment that he awoke, no matter the hour.

This promise was delivered by Pod, who was surprised to find that a small host had assembled in the Lady of Winterfell’s quarters while his wounds were being tended to. Brienne stood at her usual spot just behind Sansa and to her right. Sandor Clegane glowered from a corner by the window. Arya paced the room like a cat, clutching Needle’s hilt. And Samwell Tarly sat on the floor in front of the fire, facing the little girl from the Riverlands.

She did not want to talk, at first. She was clearly frightened by the adults in the room, and only shook her head mutely when Sansa asked her about her father, about what he might have said on their journey. 

Sam had brought one of his son’s toys for the little girl to hold, and spoke to her gently. He asked her questions that did not seem important, like her favorite games or foods, ignoring the scoffs from the others. He let the child’s silences play out, never growing impatient. And slowly, painfully, the girl began to tell them how she had come to travel North.

The man she had arrived with was not her father. He had sheltered at her family’s hut for the night, and had killed her parents and her older brother while they slept. He’d made her look at their bodies. He told her he was her father now, and if she told anyone otherwise he’d do to her what he’d done to them.

“He said there were bad people in the North,” she said in a tiny voice. “He said I was going to help him stop them.”

Sam did not press her for details on how the killer had ensured her continued obedience, but she provided some of them anyway. He listened with sorrow on his kindly, round face.

Pod, hands shaking, looked at the other faces in the room. Brienne wore naked disgust on hers, Sansa wounded resignation. The Hound’s face was as impassive as one carved from stone, but Pod noticed his eyes flick toward Arya.

The younger Stark was standing against the wall by the door, and the look on her face was one of rage. Her eyes were wild, her nostrils flared, her hands clenched into bone-white fists.

At last the girl fell silent once more. Pod saw the movement from the corner of his eye before he heard the door slam, and when he looked over Arya had vanished.

The Hound crossed the room in two long strides and was out the door before anyone else could react. Pod looked wildly at Brienne and Sansa, caught the barest of nods from both of them, and took off in pursuit.

He was halfway to the cells when he spotted them, Clegane only just catching up with Arya. The big man caught her by the shoulder and yanked her back. Arya whirled to face him, and Pod gaped at the animal fury he saw on her face.

“Don’t you _fucking_ touch me!” she screamed. She had the catspaw dagger in her hand as she lunged at the Hound, and for a horrible moment Pod thought she meant to drive it straight into the man’s heart. But he kicked her in the chest, knocking her against a wall and driving the breath from her body. Pod yelped in alarm and ran up to them.

Arya clutched her knife in one hand and braced herself against the wall with the other, gasping for breath. When she looked up there was still anger in her dark eyes, but not the bloodlust Pod had glimpsed before.

“ _Fuck_ … _you_ …” she wheezed.

“Aye, fuck me,” Clegane snapped. “I’m just the one trying to stop you from killing that bloody fool in the cells before we can interrogate him.”

“You heard what she said,” Arya hissed. “What he _did_ …”

“I heard it.” Clegane crouched in front of Arya so they were eye to eye, his voice surprisingly gentle. “Brienne heard it. _Your sister_ heard it. You think she means to let him live, after hearing that?”

Arya let out a long breath through her nose, then faintly shook her head.

“But first we have to find out _who sent him here to kill Sansa_. Or did you already forget that’s why we have him in a cell?”

"It was Cersei." Arya's voice was cold. "You know it was."

"I'd count on it. But it would pay to know who he is before you slice his face off, wouldn't you say? Perhaps he knows what else she's planning. Perhaps he's someone she trusts."

Arya closed her eyes, appearing to consider this. When she opened them up again, something had settled in her face.

“So can I trust you to be smart for a change, or are you going to turn into a bloody madwoman again the second I turn my back?”

“I’ll let him live.” Arya sheathed her dagger, and pushed herself off from the wall. “Until we get what we need from him. He’s mine after that.”

“You’ve my word, wolf-girl,” Clegane replied, rising to his feet. “Whatever that’s worth these days.”

He looked at Pod as if just noticing he was there. “The fuck are you doing here?” he growled. “You think you could fucking well stop her if I couldn’t?”

“He stopped the killer,” Arya snapped. “Sansa would be dead if not for him. You’ll not speak to him like that.”

Both men regarded her with stunned silence. Pod was the first to find his voice.

“Thank you, Arya.”

“Seven hells,” the Hound muttered, and stalked away.

Pod stared at Arya. He was afraid to speak. What she had just said was the kindest thing she had ever said about him, and he worried that whatever he said next would taint the moment, make it less precious than it was.

“Can I-“ Pod stammered. “I mean to say…is there anything-“

So much for preserving the moment. He was babbling like an idiot.

She had stepped closer to him. There was that same brightness in her eyes that he had noticed after her visit with Bran. Tears? He could not imagine her crying.

She threw her arms around him, her head coming to rest on his shoulder.

He froze for a moment, then slowly brought his hands up to rest between her shoulder blades. 

He held her and thought of the rage on her face when she'd listened to the little girl's testimony. Thought of the the casual cruelty that existed between her and the Hound. Of her protectiveness, towards Sansa, towards the child.

He held her and wished, not for the first or hundredth time, that he was as smart as Tyrion Lannister. Pod could empathize with people, perhaps better than most. But Tyrion, more than anyone Pod had ever meant, understood the _why_ of things. He'd be able to take these pieces of Arya that Pod observed, and form a total understanding of her. Pod could only look at them one by one, and try to ease pain where he sensed it.

He sensed it now. But he could not put a name to the cause of it.

“Thank you for saving my sister, Pod,” she murmured against his neck.

How sweet it was, to hold her like this. How fine, to be a hero in her eyes.

“Anything for you,” he whispered, and felt her draw tense against him. “For your family, I mean. For Winterfell.”

She looked up at him, her eyes a bit red but no sign that any tears had been spilled.

“I’m glad this is your home now,” she said. She leaned up and planted a feather-light kiss on his cheek, so fast he barely felt it. “I’m glad you’re here.”

Pod let her go, worried she’d feel his knees go weak.

“Me too,” he sighed. “My lady.”

They walked back to Sansa’s quarters in a bubble of soft, contented silence.


	6. Chapter 6

The next few days around Winterfell were tense. The would-be killer had refused to identify himself as anything other than a loyal subject of his beloved Queen Cersei, determined to help the Seven Kingdoms by eliminating the last of the traitorous Starks. While no one believed him, Lady Sansa flatly refused to allow Arya to pry more information out of him. When pressed, Sansa had hissed, “We are not the Boltons,” with such icy finality that even Arya dropped the subject.

Sansa gave the assassin three days to change his story and ask for mercy. He didn’t, and when the three days were up Sansa sentenced him to die in full view of the court. Arya carried out the sentence without a word, wiped her blade on the dead man’s shirt, and disappeared for the rest of the day and night.

When she returned she was withdrawn, and quick to anger. She trained, she ate, she slept, and for a time would seem alright. But there was no telling where her moods would take her or who she might take them out on. She was sweet and sour enough at random to make everyone nervous when she approached, but not enough to avoid her entirely.

The little girl who had accompanied the killer was given over the the care of the other Riverlands folk who had recently arrived. They were beside themselves with grief that one of their number had carried out such an attack, and had begged Sansa not to turn them out. They were permitted to stay, but the suspicion that fell over them from the rest of the castle residents was palpable.

The snows came in, trapping everyone inside the castle walls. The winds blew so cold that exposed flesh felt as if it were being torn apart by icy fingers. Nights were even worse, and as the nights got longer people began to fall ill. Sansa began asking for volunteers for night watch duty, to bring relief to the sick and ensure that everyone endured fewer shifts on the freezing battlements. Pod was one of the few southerners to volunteer right away, earning a few more charges of “lapdog” and “lickspittle” muttered from the shadows.

The night watch was not only cold but dull. The darkness and the snow made it impossible to see more than a few yards beyond the castle walls, so Pod spent his shifts alone with nothing at all to occupy his thoughts. To keep himself awake he composed lists of anything and everything he could think of: foods from his childhood he missed, names he would like to give his sons, the different types of trees that could be found in the Westerlands. 

He did it to keep himself awake, and that was reason enough that there was no need to admit that he was also trying to keep from thinking about Arya. It felt wrong to think of her as a man thinks about a woman when she was so clearly unhappy. Anytime Pod caught himself dwelling too long on the fluid grace of her body or the endearing dimple in her chin, he remembered her deep, pain-filled eyes and directed his imagination elsewhere. It was one thing to love her, but he would not disrespect his Lady by lusting after her. Not when he could help it.

As he ascended the steps for another frigid night on the battlements, he saw her silhouetted against the moonlit sky. It was a clear night, the air as clean and merciless as fresh-forged steel, and there was no one about but the two of them. 

She wore a fur cloak and gloves, but nothing covering her hair or face, and her exposed skin was bone-white in the moonlight. Pod, by contrast, was so bundled up he could hardly move, and had to gracelessly yank a wool scarf out of the way before he could address her.

“How are you not cold?” With her moods as unpredictable as they were, Pod had taken care to drop the “my lady’s” from his speech when addressing her. 

Arya shrugged. “I am.” She was looking out over the silver expanse beyond the castle walls, and did not turn to him when she spoke. “There’s worse things to be.”

“It’s strange to think about,” Pod mused, leaning on the battlements next to her. “I expected Winterfell to look like this, so it’s no surprise. But King’s Landing must look like this too. And farther South, all the way down to the Reach. I just can’t picture it. Snow outside the Red Keep.”

“All those pretty southern ladies shivering in their silk dresses,” Arya said with a smirk. “I hope Cersei gets frostbite. I hope her fingers fall off. And her nose.”

Pod laughed.

“I’m glad she sent that killer, in a way,” Arya continued. 

Surprised, Pod said nothing, only tilted his head and frowned.

“Means we’re not the only people left in the world.” She nodded at the vast, cold emptiness before them. “Sometimes it feels like we are. It’s easy to imagine that everyone else is dead. Jon, Gendry, the dragons…that shit who tried to kill you and Sansa is the first sign we’ve had in weeks that there’s anyone else out there.”

Pod thought of a frozen world, populated only by the dead. Dead men toiling in icy fields, dead animals moving through gray and creaking forests, dead knights astride dead horses. Suddenly he wanted, more than anything in the world, to be standing in a green field with the sun on his shoulders. It was a physical ache, so strong he thought he might be ill. 

His thoughts were interrupted by Arya grabbing his arm, gently. “ _Listen_ ,” she whispered, and in that moment she sounded so much like any eager girl with a secret that it broke Pod’s heart.

He obeyed, and leaned against the wall by her side, and listened. The wind gusted in his ears, and at first he confused the wind itself for the sound he was listening for, but then it passed and still he heard it. A deep, feral cry, as if the earth itself were weeping. And high, lonely wails joining in.

“Wolves?”

“Not just any wolves,” Arya answered. “It’s her. It’s Nymeria. She’s followed me here.”

Pod stared at her rapturous, moonlit face, badly wanting to understand.

“I dreamed,” she sighed. “I was running over the fields with my pack, and I was _warm_ , Pod, I was so warm, and then I crested the hill and saw Winterfell. And I woke up and I knew she was here.”

He didn’t dare speak. He sensed she was saying things to him that she would never repeat. This might be the only time he heard this particular tone in her voice, this girlish wonder beneath such gravity. To interrupt and possibly never hear it again was unthinkable.

“I had dreams of her, of being her, from the night I sent her away,” Arya continued. “Then I went to Braavos, and I was No One, and I didn’t have the dreams anymore. But they’ve come back since I’ve come home.”

He listened. It was the only thing he could do.

In the distance the wolves howled, and a few feet away from him Arya told him stories of running with her pack in her dreams, and the sounds mingled in Pod’s ears to become one song of loss and loneliness.

He wasn’t aware of them drifting closer to one another until she fell silent and he realized he was close enough to hear her breathing. 

They were standing side by side, their arms touching. Quickly, before he had a chance to talk himself out of it, Pod put his arm around her shoulders.

She tensed, but only for a moment. Then she let out a soft sigh and leaned against him.

Pod thought of turning towards her, of tilting her face up to his and kissing her here in the moonlight. _She won’t be in Winterfell long_ , he remembered Bronn saying. 

It was so cold. It would be so good, to hold someone and be held, to touch and be touched. To feel alive, in a world that was slowly dying.

Arya was human. Pod knew that, even if others forgot it sometime. Couldn’t she want the same thing?

The howl that rent the air was so loud and startling that at first Pod thought it was a reaction to his thoughts, somehow. The walls themselves renouncing his weakness.

He jumped, but Arya only pulled her arm away and leaned out over the battlements. She did not flinch as another terrible, feral cry rang out. But he heard her gasp as she caught sight of the source of it.

Pod looked where she was looking, and a fist of ice clenched around his heart.

The wolves had come closer to the walls. He could see each individual one in sharp relief on the sparkling snow below, twining listlessly about their leader. The largest of them stood still, gazing up at the walls, and before it threw its head back to let out another blood-curdling howl, Pod saw its eyes.

Blue. Blue as crystals, as the root of a flame, as a sky Pod feared he would never see again.

The dead wolves sent their mad cries up the walls of Winterfell, up to the waiting ears of Arya Stark. Pod saw Arya’s face twist with anguish, saw tears glittering on her face like diamonds in the moonlight, but she did not scream.

Instead she drew her sword and moved to climb atop the battlements.

Pod grabbed her without hesitation, caring not in the slightest that she might run him through for it. To die at her hand might be the best he could hope for, now. And he would not see her broken at the base of the walls, or torn apart by the abominations waiting outside.

He pulled her off the wall and she shoved him away. 

"You can't go out there," he began.

"Try to stop me again, and I'll kill you."

"So kill me. I'd rather die than watch those... _things_ rip you to shreds."

Her eyes were wild, and her voice shook as she said, “I can’t do this.”

Pod moved toward her and she shook her head. 

“I can’t do this,” she repeated. “A debt is owed. I gave a name to the Red God, and until I give him what I promised…” She looked out over the wall again and shuddered. “This won’t stop. Until I stop it.”

“Arya, please,” Pod gasped. “You’re not making sense.”

She darted around him easily and took off down the steps. Pod followed, abandoning his post. He feared she meant to charge straight out into the snow, and was slightly relieved when he realized she wasn’t heading toward the gate, but to the keep.

She wasn’t running, just walking quickly, and when Pod caught up with her she did not try to run away. She was muttering to herself.

“Queen Cersei. Ser Ilyn. Ser Gregor. The Red Woman. Queen Cersei…”

That fervent repetition was even more terrible than the cries of the wolves. It sounded like madness. It sounded like everything he hadn’t wanted to believe about her.

He didn’t dare touch her, but he kept pace with her and tried to speak reason. She reacted to him not a bit. She only turned to look at him when they were standing outside Bran’s room.

“I can’t stay here,” she told Pod. Her voice was calm now, and sad. “I need to speak to my brother. And then I have to go.”

“Arya-“

She opened the door and brandished her dagger at Pod.

“If anyone tries to come in,” she warned, “I’ll kill them. Even you, Pod.”

She shut the door in his face, leaving Pod standing in the silent hallway.


	7. Chapter 7

Pod kept watch. She had not asked him to, but he could think of nothing else that mattered to him anymore.

People came; his fellow guards, then the Hound, to shout at him for leaving his post, then eventually Lady Sansa, irritation and concern warring on her pale face. He told them all the same thing. That Arya was inside, with Bran. That she did not wish to be disturbed. That they could drag him away, if they must, but he would not leave willingly.

To protect others from danger, Pod told them. He could not speak the real truth, the belief rooted in him that all the frightful things, past and future, were trapped inside this room, and if he abandoned his post they would come rushing out and consume them all. And Arya would be lost to him forever.

He spoke to them of danger, and duty, and straightened his shoulders and planted his feet. And they did not have him dragged away.

He felt an ache in his chest when he saw Brienne approach. It would disgrace him as a squire, to defy his lady this way, but he could not walk away from this door even for her.

She was carrying a waterskin and some sort of bread wrapped in cloth. For Arya, he presumed.

“I can’t open the door, m’lady,” Pod croaked through dry lips. “She said she’d kill anyone who came in.”

Brienne thrust the items into his hands. “They’re for you, oaf.”

Pod turned the food over in his hands, feeling as if they belonged to someone else. Brown bread, wrapped around some kind of sausage, and as the smell hit him Pod’s stomach twisted with hunger.

It was gone in a few seconds, the water fast behind it, while Brienne watched with a wary smile on her face.

“You’ve been here for hours, you know,” she remarked. “A night’s watch before that. It’s a wonder you’re still on your feet.”

Only as she spoke did Pod realize how tired he was. He leaned back against the wall, suddenly dizzy, and Brienne’s face softened with concern.

“Go get some sleep, Pod.”

“I can’t, my lady. It’s too dangerous-“

“I’ll keep watch here, Pod.”

“I can’t…I won’t leave her.”

“Pod…” Brienne huffed an impatient sigh and Pod thought she might be about to just carry him off. Instead she sighed again and took a seated position against the wall across from him. “Will you sit, at least? I’m afraid you’re going to pass out and crack your skull.”

Pod acquiesced, stiff knees crying out with relief as he sank to the floor. 

Brienne stretched out her long legs and waited. He did not speak, but she did not press. Silent companionship came easy to them after all this time. He felt grateful she was here; it was simple, and good, to sit with her and share the space and not speak, not worry.

He felt so tired.

When Brienne asked him what happened, it was hard, hard to lie. But he could not bear to speak of the blue-eyed wolves, or Arya’s reaction. They were trapped in this room, those things. Perhaps they’d never happened. Perhaps Arya would emerge, wounded but strong as always, and things would continue to hold together a while longer.

“She thinks she knows a way to help Bran,” he told her. “To get his Sight back, without hurting him…doesn’t want to be disturbed, could be dangerous…”

Brienne looked sidelong at him. _She knows_ , Pod thought, _of course she does_. But when Brienne spoke, it was not to call him a liar or demand he step away from the door. 

“Pod, are you crying?”

He’d never heard her speak so gently. 

“Pod?”

He shook his head, even as he felt the tears roll down his cheeks and make a liar of him once more.

“What really happened, Pod?”

“We…” Pod took a shuddering breath. “We’re all going to die here, aren’t we?”

She said nothing, and that was answer enough.

Pod had watched men die. He’d killed, and there had been times since he’d become a squire where he’d known he might die too.

But there was _dying_ , and there was _being dead_ , and it was the latter Pod realized he was afraid of.

When he thought of death, now, he didn’t think of the effluent smell of battle, or bones crumbling in the earth. He thought of the creatures that were surely on their way to Winterfell, marching ever forward, their skin falling from their bodies but nothing stopping them because they could not suffer, could not want, could not feel at all…

Could that be death? Just hunger, and hunger, and nothing, and nothing?

“My lady,” he whispered. “Brienne.”

She looked at him, eyes calm and blue and blameless.

“Don’t let me…come back. As one of those things. Burn me, or cut me apart, I don’t care, but don’t let me-“

“I won’t.”

Brienne leaned forward, gripped his upper arm.

“By the old gods and the new. I swear it.”

She did not ask him why such things were on his mind, just gave her word, and he felt a surge of affection and trust for her. It bore his next words up to his lips, his voice sounding far away in his own ears.

“Arya’s leaving soon.”

“She told you that?”

“She did.” Pod let his head fall back against the wall, his eyes heavy. “She said she needed to speak to Bran, and then she’s going to leave. I think she’s going to go south. To kill Cersei.”

“And you mean to stop her?” Brienne’s voice was not mocking, only curious.

“No,” Pod answered, straightening up a little. “Even if I could, I mean. I wouldn’t.”

Brienne raised an eyebrow as if she suspected him of lying again, and Pod hurried on.

“I wouldn’t. She’s…not to be kept. By me, or by anyone. She can’t be.”

“That’s why you love her,” Brienne said softly.

Said like that, there seemed no point in denying it. 

“I’m just afraid if I go to sleep, I’ll wake up and she’ll be gone.” Pod worked his hands together as he tried to explain. “She’ll go south, and she’ll never come back, and I’ll never leave this place.”

Brienne looked like she meant to object, and Pod shook his head to stop her.

“And that’s alright, truly. I’ll die to protect you, and Lady Sansa, and the people of Winterfell. It’s a noble death, a true knight’s death…but I can’t stand the thought of her being out there all alone, when I go. I want something… _better_ for her. I don’t want to die before I know she has it.”

He chewed his lip, wishing Brienne would call him a fool or a lapdog or any other of the other insults he’d grown used to. It felt too raw, to say these things and have Brienne watch him so closely.

Eventually she crossed her legs, folded her hands in her lap, settling into a more comfortable position against the wall.

“At least rest your eyes, Pod,” she said. “I’ll stay here. I’ll wake you if anything happens. You can trust me.”

He could. He did.

He let his head tip back into velvet darkness.

——

He awoke to the sound of the door creaking open, a vicious cramp in his neck. Brienne still had a hand on his shoulder to shake him awake as he sprang to his feet.

Arya stood in the doorway to Bran’s room, her face pale, sweat beading her brow, eyes blown wide and furious. Pod could see Bran curled small on the bed behind her, his hawkish face flushed and his eyes squeezed shut.

Pod and Brienne stood shoulder to shoulder, tense, waiting to see if Arya meant to lunge at them, dart past them, or simply stand there, restrained anger present in every line of her body.

When she spoke they had to lean forward to hear her.

“Kingslayer,” she hissed. “Take us to him.”

She looked up at them, teeth bared.

“Take us to Jaime Lannister.”


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again to everyone who has been reading and commenting! As you might be able to tell, I'm shy, but I definitely appreciate you guys!
> 
> This chapter took forever to get right in my head, and consequently is kind of short. Hopefully now that I'm past this roadblock the rest of the updates will come a bit faster.

Pod had no idea why Arya was suddenly demanding to see Jaime Lannister. Her face, and the knot of worry in his gut, told him grave matters were about, but that was all he knew. 

Ser Jaime had arrived at Winterfell with Bronn in tow the day after Bran’s frightening mishap. Brought before Sansa, he had renounced Cersei and pledged to join the fight against the Night King.

The Northern Lords wanted him executed on the spot. Too dangerous, they had claimed, to leave him alive. Brienne had vouched for her friend’s honor, stopping just short of begging Sansa to spare him. Arya had watched the proceedings in silence, and Bran, at the time, had been too ill to leave his bed.

After listening to the opposing arguments, Sansa had ordered Jaime Lannister put in the cells. He was to be kept alive and treated gently, she had stressed. His warning them of Cersei’s betrayal was appreciated, and it would not do for the brother of the Queen’s Hand to be harmed in any way. But he had warred against the Starks, and would not be given free run of Winterfell until King Jon returned and passed his royal judgement.

It was as much for Ser Jaime’s protection as their own, Sansa had remarked. Jaime had politely replied that he did not believe that for a second, but did not resist as he was led away to the cells.

Pod had not seen him since then. He suspected Brienne had visited him, and he knew that Sansa had had him questioned after the assassination attempt, but as far as he knew Arya had never spoken to him.

He looked questioningly at Brienne, and was shocked to see the knight’s face had gone ghost-white. He thought he detected a tremor in her voice when she spoke.

“Arya, I…I’m not sure that’s wise.”

Arya’s predatory eyes fixed on Brienne. There was none of her playfulness or quiet grace to be found. They were standing before a wild animal, and Pod found himself shifting into a defensive stance against his will.

“You know,” Arya growled.

Brienne’s eyes flicked to Pod, then back to Arya. “Please,” she whispered. “Not here.”

Arya laughed, a jagged sound utterly free of humor. “In front of Pod, you mean?” She looked at Pod and giggled. “She fucking lied to you too, then? Or just figured you too stupid to find out?”

“I don’t understand,” Pod muttered, hating the words.

“Of course you don’t,” Arya snarled. “You never understand anything, do you, none of you _fucking_ …” She took a deep breath and looked back at Brienne. “Tell him.”

Arya retreated back into the room and sat on the bed, next to Bran. The Stark boy’s eyes were open now, blinking owlishly in the light, tears pooling on his cheeks. Pod saw a fine trickle of blood dried beneath his nostrils, and he was still breathing heavily.

With some difficulty, Arya heaved Bran into a seated position next to her, her brother’s head resting on her shoulder. 

“My brother stops speaking, and a day later the Kingslayer returns to Winterfell.” Bran groaned and clutched weakly at his sister’s arm as she spoke. “And all we care about is that he can’t use his Sight anymore. We never stop to think about why he might not be using it. We never realize that maybe all he can see now is the man who tried to kill him.”

“The golden man,” Bran murmured, his eyes fixed on nothing.

“He tries to warn us, and it nearly kills him again. And he’s been living in terror since then, afraid to speak, to think…” Arya turned and placed a kiss on her brother’s forehead. “I’m sorry, Bran.”

Bran said nothing. He closed his eyes.

“We’ve been living under the same roof as the man who destroyed our family. And you… _knew_.”

“I did,” Brienne replied, her tone heavy. “As did your mother. And still she put him in my care, to trade for your sister. She released him to me because she valued her daughters’ safety more than revenge, Arya, surely you can-“

“And now she’s DEAD!” Arya shouted. Bran winced but did not pull away from her. “She trusted him- and you- and now she’s _dead_. The Lannisters killed us all and _you’ve been protecting one of them_.”

“Yes.”

Pod saw Brienne’s throat work, knew she was using every ounce of her will to hold back tears. 

“ _Why?_ ”

Huddled together on the bed, with the tears on Bran’s face and the confusion in Arya’s voice, they seemed very much like children in this moment. And yet it was Brienne that Pod felt a need to shield right then, Brienne who he knew would carry scars from this conversation.

“I owe him my life,” Brienne answered, hanging her head. “I could not tell you when I knew it would mean his death.”

Arya looked between Pod and Brienne, helpless fury on her face.

“I can’t trust any of you,” she said in a very small voice.

“Arya, you know I would never do you harm. Pod and I, we’re sworn to-“

“Go away.”

“Arya, please-“

“GO AWAY!” Her scream sliced through Pod’s head and left stinging pain in its wake. It occurred to Pod that others must be overhearing this.

“My lady,” Pod whispered, touching Brienne’s elbow. “Perhaps some time would help.”

Brienne cast a final hurt glance at Arya, then let Pod guide her away. He felt another pang in his head as the door slammed once more.

“Pod,” Brienne said thickly. “Inform Lady Sansa that we’ll need to triple the watch by Jai- the Kingslayer’s cell. Tell her I believe Arya means to kill him. I’ll go inform the guards there now.”

“At once, my lady,” Pod replied, but he lingered by her side. “Brienne, is there anything I can do?”

Brienne shook her head hastily. “Go.”

What else could Pod do? He went.

——

His tasks completed, Pod collapsed into bed and immediately fell into black, bottomless sleep. Whether Brienne let him rest on purpose or had simply forgotten about him, Pod did not know. But when he woke a fresh dawn was breaking, and Pod regarded the silver sunrise with a sense of dread.

It did not take long for his fears to be confirmed. He saw castle guards whispering in corners and felt his anxiety grow. And when he entered the great hall and saw Sansa, Brienne and the Hound conversing with identical grim looks on their faces, he felt the despair settle in his stomach like a large stone.

Arya was gone.


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Life completely ate up all my free time, but we're coming up on the end! Probably one more chapter after this.

Pod still thought the falling snow was beautiful.

Winter had taken everything from him, removed all the good things from the world and replaced them with hunger and betrayal and death. Still, he watched the feathery flakes fall without a sound as the sky moved from black to grey, and felt moved in some place the cold could not reach.

Did that make him a fool, or merely a man?

Pod shouldered his pack and guided his horse silently across the castle grounds. First light, and the only souls awake had duties to attend to, tasks to complete before they could come in from the cold. They paid him no mind. 

In the day and night since Arya’s disappearance, Winterfell had seemed to hold its breath. Those who knew her only as the younger Lady Stark feared for her, while those who knew her as the assassin of Winterfell dreaded her return, certain she meant to kill them all. 

Those who truly knew her only felt sorrow. Brienne wore her guilt like a cloak, and had spoken barely two words to Pod since the morning of Arya’s disappearance.

Pod was glad of it. He would not have been able to lie to her, and he knew she’d never permit what he was about to do.

Dawn had not yet chased the night’s shadows away completely. The figure hulking by the gates appeared faceless, but Pod still recognized the Hound well enough. He felt a twinge of fear and let his hand drift to his sword.

“Payne.”

The growl traveled as far as Pod’s ears, and no farther. 

Pod pulled his horse to a halt and drew himself tall in the saddle.

“Clegane.”

The Hound did not draw steel nor advance, but neither did he move aside, and Pod felt his heart begin to race.

“I’ll fight you,” Pod said, gracelessly but with no hesitation. “I don’t want to, and I’ll probably lose. But you’ll have to kill me to stop me from going after her.”

Clegane laughed with his usual joylessness. “You want to go die in the snow, you think I care about you enough to stop you?”

“I’ll be a deserter,” Pod answered. “You’d be betraying King Jon by letting me go.”

“I don’t serve Jon Snow.” He said it so quietly Pod could barely hear it. 

Pod kept his hand on his sword hilt, and he waited.

“She doesn’t need your help, you know. To do what she means to do.”

“She’s still one girl, alone out there. If she’s in any condition to tell me to bugger off, I will. But if she’s starving, or wounded, I can’t just leave her out there.”

“Do you think there’s anything left of her you can rescue?”

Pod thought of Arya on the battlements, Arya holding Bran, Arya kissing him on the cheek. “Yes.”

Clegane closed the distance between them, sword still at his side. Even from horseback Pod still found himself intimidated by the man, and tensed when Clegane gripped his arm and fixed him with his cold grey eyes.

“If she’s dead,” he growled, “you make sure she stays dead. Do you understand?”

The thought of Arya’s eyes turned that horrid shade of blue hit Pod like a punch in the gut. He nodded tersely. 

His arm was released, and a moment later came the sound of the gate swinging open.

“If you find her like that, and you don’t have the strength to…” The Hound coughed, as if trying to force the words from his throat. “To finish things. Don’t bother coming back.”

Pod didn’t respond. He kicked his horse into a run and set off away from Winterfell toward the south.

——

Pod made for the Kingsroad. He didn’t have much faith in his ability to track Arya’s horse in the snow, so if she had chosen to go another way he would not find her. It was a risk he accepted. He might fail in his mission. He might not be coming back to Winterfell.

Still, he had a sense that the Kingsroad was the correct course to take. What did Arya have to hide from? Dead men? More assassins? She’d kill them all and relish the chance to keep her skills sharp on her way to Cersei.

He rode hard all day, stopping only enough to ensure his horse didn’t fall dead from exhaustion. The iron-grey sky was beginning to dim when he saw the tracks.

Pod was no gifted tracker, but the commotion that had occurred was written so plainly in the snow that even a child could deduce it. The deep marks of hooves where a horse had stopped, reared, bolted. The paw prints, circling around, drawing closer, some as large as the horse’s hooves by the look of them.

The tracks led off into the woods. Pod said a prayer to the Mother and followed them.

The shifting scenery of white and grey and brown made it hard to focus on individual shapes, and Pod was worried he would miss what he was looking for. But he spotted the form on the ground well enough, ringed in blackish-red as it was.

He rode up to the dead horse and felt that creeping sense of wrongness that had served him well since coming North.

The horse’s back was to him, the saddle bloodied and askew. But there was no slim figure crushed beneath it, no smaller form sprawled nearby. Yet Pod felt no relief as he approached.

There were no ravens on the corpse, he realized. No birds, no foxes, no carrion-eaters of any kind, despite the vast quantity of meat lying on the forest floor for the taking.

Pod dismounted and walked around the body, already knowing what he was going to see.

The horse’s guts had been ripped out and lay glistening in the snow. One of it’s legs was missing, and another had nearly been torn off. It was horrible, but nothing Pod had not seen before.

Crystal blue eyes lolled up at him, and Pod thought briefly about going mad. Just abandoning his wits and taking off raving into the snow, into the arms of the old gods.

The dead horse struggled to rise, making chuffing sounds Pod would mistake for breathing except no steam rose from its nostrils. Its blue eyes tracked him, and Pod might have wept if he saw hatred there, or a plea for mercy. But in its eyes there was nothing at all.

He’d been given a short sword of dragon glass, when he’d pledged to fight for the King in the North. He drew that weapon now and knelt by the dead horse’s side.

He meant to cut its throat, but when he looked down he saw that he had plunged the sword straight through the creature’s eye. He’d driven it in so hard it had run all the way through the skull and pierced the ground beneath.

The blue eyes went black, and Pod instantly felt better. He pulled the sword free and wiped it on the creature’s hide, forcing his eyes not to linger on the black smear it left behind.

The wolf tracks, stained and chaotic, led on.

——

As Pod followed he braced himself for more the sight of more blood. Not the rust-colored ichor the dead left behind, but the blinding scarlet that would tell him Arya was wounded, maybe dead.

He could not have prepared himself for what he found. 

When he came upon the rock formation, he immediately saw it as a good place to establish high ground and fend off an attack. He wondered if Arya had known it was there or had been extraordinarily lucky.

She was seated against the rocks, fancy dagger clutched in her fist, dead wolves all around her. The largest of them lay with its head in her lap, eyes closed. Pod might have thought it sleeping, if not for the black blood pooled beneath it. Beneath her.

Arya was petting the direwolf’s fur, stroking her ears. Tears ran down the girl’s filthy cheeks, and she was speaking in a voice too soft for Pod to hear.

At the sound of Pod’s approaching horse she fell silent, and looked up. Her movements were slow, devoid of fear. There was nothing in these woods that could threaten her.

She saw Pod, and when she spoke her voice was cracked and halting, as if she’d forgotten how to use it.

“I had to do it,” she croaked. “I couldn’t leave her like that.”

Pod got off his horse and crept toward her as if she were a deer who might bolt at the smallest sound.

“Arya,” he whispered. “Do you want to come home?”

She shook her head, and hugged the dead wolf to her like a child. “Home’s gone,” she murmured. “Or maybe I’m the one that’s gone. Arya Stark. I thought I could be Arya again, but I can’t. I’d rather be No One.”

“You’re not No One,” Pod pleaded. “If you need to go, I understand, I do. I’m not here to drag you back. But don’t tell me you’re No One. You’re Arya, and I’d die for you.”

She looked up at him, her eyes huge and brimming over.

“I can’t watch any more of my friends die,” she choked, and then started sobbing into the dead wolf’s fur.

Pod went to her, stumbling over rocks and the bodies of wolves, falling to his knees by her in the snow. She looked up, regarded the dagger still in her hand, then flung it aside and threw her arms around his neck.

She smelled like blood, and sweat, and dust. Her skin was tacky where their faces touched and the sharp jut of her chin bruised his shoulder. But he savored it. It would be over all too soon.

He held her long after her tears had subsided. She seemed content to drift in his arms, their breath rising and falling in time. 

It was getting dark when she spoke again.

“Make camp with me for the night. You can ride back to Winterfell in the morning.”

“What about you?” he whispered into her hair.

“I’m going south,” Arya replied, pulling back form him. “To finish my list.”

“And then?”

“And then Arya Stark can be whoever she wants to be. Or no one at all.”

“Do you think you’d ever come back to Winterfell?” Pod hated the way he sounded when he asked the question, like a clueless little boy. But he didn’t know another way to ask.

Arya shrugged. “I might. Or I might go farther south. Past the Summer Isles. Or west. Does anyone know what’s west of Westeros?”

“Won’t you be lonely?”

She smiled faintly. “I’m lonely now. At least this way I’ll have some hope that some of the people I love are still alive.”

“I could come with you,” he pleaded, knowing she’d never permit it. “Or-“

“Pod,” she whispered. “Please stop talking. It’s getting dark. And there’s something else we need to do before we make camp.”

Pod looked around at the bodies surrounding them, and after a moment rose to gather firewood.

——

They held each other in the warmth of the wolves’ pyre, and Pod fell asleep and woke up smelling blood and smoke.


	10. Chapter 10

Pod was cold. He’d been other things, once, but now cold was all that remained.

There had been a time, not too long ago, he thought, when he had held a beautiful girl in his arms. Fallen asleep with his nose in her hair. Kissed her, maybe, during that hazy time between sleep and waking.

He walked. He knew if he stopped he would fall, and not get up again. So he did not stop.

He thought he’d had a horse, when he began this journey. He ridden away from Winterfell on horseback, and then there had been the dead horse and wolves’ blood and Arya’s breath on his neck in the dark, and now he was walking through the snow. Had he given her his horse? He hoped so. It was the right thing to do, something a true knight would have done.

True night. He wouldn’t survive a night out here alone. He had to make it back to Winterfell. He didn’t want to die out here, without even the soft earth to claim his bones.

He wished he had the strength to sing a song as he walked. It would pass the time, and make him feel less alone. If Bronn were here, he would be singing. Pod smiled at the thought of his friend, hoped he would see him again. He wanted to hear a song again, before he died.

There was a sharp hiss in his ear, and Pod turned toward it, wondering if someone was now walking beside him. Company would be good. But he was still alone. He shrugged and continued walking, but another hiss in his ear made him turn, and this time he saw an arrow quivering in the snow beside him. 

He looked up. The walls of Winterfell loomed ahead. He hadn’t even seen them as he approached. He couldn’t remember seeing anything since the pyre he and Arya had built burned down to embers.

He waved his arms, as if to greet the walls themselves. Winterfell was home now, and the sight of home was just as welcome as a friendly face. He waved, and called out a greeting to the silent walls.

No more arrows came, but he heard shouting from a long way off. He continued to stumble home, and was delighted when a figure ran out from the gates to greet him.

“Bronn?” Pod croaked, looking up into that familiar craggy face. “I need your help. I can’t think of a single song, and it’s too quiet.”

“Seven bloody hells,” Bronn responded, looping an arm around Pod’s midsection. “We thought you were dead, you know. Both kinds of dead. First one, then the other.”

Bronn was half-carrying him through the gates now. Pod was vaguely aware of more people gathered around, and felt absurdly grateful they’d all come out to greet him. He tried to call out his thanks, but only succeeded in coughing weakly.

“Someone get the maester,” he heard Bronn say. A pause, then, louder, “I said get the fucking maester!”

Pod faded in and out. He heard Brienne’s voice, and Sansa’s. At some point he noticed he was indoors. When he felt his sodden clothes being pulled off of him he tried to protest, embarrassed, but he couldn’t speak very loudly and was ignored. Then he was being lifted, and lowered into a tub of hot water, and his frozen hands and feet were suddenly burning. He groaned and tried to rise, felt strong hands on his shoulders.

“Be still,” he heard Brienne murmur. “You’re safe.”

“No one is safe,” Pod slurred.

Brienne shushed him, because she did not understand.

——

When Pod returned to clarity, he found himself naked and in bed. His right foot, protruding from beneath the blankets, was wrapped in bandages. 

Sansa and Brienne were seated near the bed, and Pod took a moment to make sure he was sufficiently covered by the blanket before asking them about his foot.

“You lost two toes,” Brienne said bluntly. “You’re lucky it wasn’t more. What were you thinking?”

Pod looked to Sansa, watching him with hooded eyes. Brienne, the muscles in her neck taut, her jaw set. Both of them braced, he knew, for bad news.

“I needed her to know I cared enough to go after her. Even if all she did was send me back,” Pod said hoarsely. “I needed her to know we’ll miss her when she’s gone.”

Sansa took a shuddering breath and looked at her hands. 

“She’s gone, then?”

This from Brienne, her blue eyes wide and wounded.

“She may yet come back.” Pod chose to believe it as he said it. 

Sansa laughed, a thin, brittle sound.

“People who love Starks die, Pod,” she sighed. “You should know that by now.”

Pod lifted his chin. “I’m still alive, my lady.”

Over Sansa’s shoulder, Brienne nodded. Sansa did not see it, but Pod did.

“We’re still alive.”

——

_That night, Podrick Payne had the sweetest dream the Seven ever saw fit to send a man._

_In his dream, there was a warm wind blowing through his hair. Not the ashy wind of a battlefield, but the soft warm breath of spring. The field he was standing on was a patchwork of melting snow and achingly, sacredly green grass._

_All around him was the sound of voices raised in song, in laughter. Then he heard the horns and knew what was happening. A tourney. There was something to celebrate._

_The white queen and the black king sat regally on their thrones, and all around them were round-faced children, ladies in colorful gowns, knights in gleaming armor. Pod wasn’t sure what the celebration was about, but he saw the queen and king holding hands, and knew that today was a day of joy._

_And Ser Podrick Payne was the champion of the tourney that day, unmatched in skill and gallantry. He bested all competitors with ease, and afterward each rival embraced him like a brother, for there could be no bad feeling on such a gift of a day._

_And his hand was raised in victory, and his friends, oh, his friends, their faces flushed with wine and with love, applauded and sang._

_And then Pod was holding a garland made of flowers, and was making his way to the stands where the nobles were gathered, to crown the Queen of Love and Beauty._

_She was there at the top of the steps, resplendent in blue and grey, her sword proudly at her side. She did not blush, nor hide her eyes, when he presented the crown to her. She took it as her due, and grasped his hands in hers, and her wise black eyes met his as he placed the crown over her dark hair._

_And a gasp went up from the crowd, for in that moment they saw Arya Stark the way that he saw her. The fiercest, proudest, most beautiful woman in the world._

It was another cold night in Winterfell, but Podrick Payne smiled in his sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, everyone! I hope Season 8 brings better fortunes for our beloved characters than I could dream up, but if you enjoyed this work anyway I'm glad!


End file.
